How do you make sisters win?

[oreaper84]

Id like this to be a topic for victorious regailment and lamentations, share your insight plz....

I find that i run a very infantry based list,(at which we can excell) with a couple of transports and exorcists for support. I find that my victories come when i exploit the fact that i can outdeploy my opponent with powerarmoured bolter gals. At the end of the day our basics are more cost effective than thiers so I find when i focus fire on the "special toys" of the other army what is left we have left is better or we have more of, sometimes both. Also i find that my victories come when i really focus on eliminating a target completely before moving on. It when i attack peicemeal that i get smoked. Just some thoughts for me....what are the other opinions out there on making the sisters victorious?

[Shifte]

My victories are usually won via my three Battle Sister squads (with rhinos) being brought to bear in support of one another in a crucial turn. Normally St. Celestine, my Exorcists and my scouting dominions can distract the enemy long enough for this to work. It really depends upon what you play against, though. I tend to play against non-tournament styled lists.

 

Though, in saying that, it has beaten its fair share of tourney forces.

[Sabathiel]

I get my victories by spamming vechicles that are hard to kill like Repressors and Excorists which are AV 13, two Vengance weapon batteries which are forfications and and avenger which is flyer making it hard to shot.  Spamming all this makes it hard for my oppenent to kill anything while I am able to pick off his forces and weaken him while staying at full strenght.

[Eddie Orlock]

'Smuch as I'd like to help, I haven't played an army loyal to the big E this edition, let alone my sisters.

 

I tend to find my best and most consistent successes come from out maneuvering my opponenets to achieve either a favourable mismatch or lopsided local concentration.

 

Any enemy that can't make it to the objectives is one less that you need to eliminate.

 

Your comment about 'special' units is quite fair though, they're usually fairly high in the output/durability quotient which makes them attractive targets.

[Naminé]

I run different lists almost everytime; sometimes I focus on regular battle sisters but usually it is the sheer hard-hitting power of my assaults that wins me games. Generally there is simply too much lethal stuff on the table for my opponent to deal with.

 

I must be doing something right, my winning streak is starting to get ridiculous. The only game I've ever lost with my sisters was my first (and even that came down to a 50-50 dice roll at the end).

[Shifte]

I run different lists almost everytime; sometimes I focus on regular battle sisters but usually it is the sheer hard-hitting power of my assaults that wins me games. Generally there is simply too much lethal stuff on the table for my opponent to deal with.

 

I must be doing something right, my winning streak is starting to get ridiculous. The only game I've ever lost with my sisters was my first (and even that came down to a 50-50 dice roll at the end).

 

I've had a similar ratio, myself. I think I'd struggle with flyer heavy lists, though.

[oreaper84]

_{Assaults? like close combat what is that? Kidding aside the 3 cc threats i see that we have are the Jbomb, Celestine, and repentia. Are you using one or all of these Namine? using them all will see at least one gets there but they all have different utilities of use or so ive been led to believe. How do you make the assaults work for you?}

[Eddie Orlock]

The only game I've ever lost with my sisters was my first (and even that came down to a 50-50 dice roll at the end).

Me thunks that's less a commentary on your skill than it is on your peers lack of skill.

[Naminé]

_{Assaults? like close combat what is that? Kidding aside the 3 cc threats i see that we have are the Jbomb, Celestine, and repentia. Are you using one or all of these Namine? using them all will see at least one gets there but they all have different utilities of use or so ive been led to believe. How do you make the assaults work for you?}

It depends on what I need for my list, for counter assault I'll look to repentia; if I need to be the aggressor then Pen engines all the way. Battle conclave can wipe anything in the game but sometimes I run Uriah in a big squad of sisters for mass attacks. I usually run one of each type. Of course you need to back this up with lots of shooting. LOTS of shooting :) (another reason why I like Pen engines).

[Shifte]

 

The only game I've ever lost with my sisters was my first (and even that came down to a 50-50 dice roll at the end).

Me thunks that's less a commentary on your skill than it is on your peers lack of skill.

 

It IS very easy for a competitive (read: viable) Sisters build to steamroller less competitively built MEQ armies, I find. A friend of mine isn't an unskilled player - but if you know how to herd Space Marines, Sisters can obliterate them. 

[Fibonacci]

Here are some of my past games. 

http://battlesisters.blogspot.com/

 

I rely on mobility and overwhelming force to eliminate whole units at a time -- which is what you need when fighting Necrons anyway.  Melta and flamer has long been the staple weapons and 6th edition has not changed that  Melta has been very good to me but I am liking flamers even more now.

[oreaper84]

i liked you bat reps Fib To me its the narrative that makes the difference. I can vouch for the feeling of leaning to flames. I used to melta spam as well but i am limiting melta to a more purely anti tank role. once i did the math given the range of the standard melta the flamer almost always stats better and has the defence benefit. Also flamer tend to be underestimated....whats in that rhino....10 sisters with 4 flamers and a combi....why would you bring regualr flamers harharhar.........comence evil smile

[Flake]

Play to the objective. With the exception of a match-up like Green Tide, you'll always be on the defensive. So whatever you do, play to the objective. Control as many as you can, and deny all others.

 

Recently I played Sisters in a 1750 tournament and did okay. My final battle was against Grey Knights and it was a nightmare. An army that does pretty much everything our army does but better. I only had three things going for me: St. Celestine, my opponent not having a clue what a Sisters army can do, and his becoming so distracted that he lost track of time. It was an ugly win but the look on his face when he realized I had been systematically feeding my elites, fast attack, and heavy support into the combat after combat with his Terminators just to keep him from having time to reach an objective was priceless.

 

Sisters can win but it will almost always be an uphill battle. That's part of the reason I play them.

[FashaTheDog]

Step 1: Flip table

Step 2: Set foe on fire.

Step 3: ???

Step 4: Profit.

[Warsmith Aznable]

Exorcists, Retributors, and Celestine.

 

Send Celestine to harass their backfield, the Exorcists pump out high AP direct fire against their biggest threats to your scoring troops, and the Retributors get in a good position to target their scoring troops as those troops move up toward midfield objectives.

 

Uriah and a Battle Conclave can be rolled out in higher point games to tarpit or destroy the elites that come after your backfield, or they can be sent to contest midfield objectives as they are needed.

 

This is my normal battle plan.

 

I am also using occasionally SM allies to get into the enemy line and hit select targets, points and whim depending.

 

EDIT: it's also vital to avoid HtH unless you're Repentia, a Battle Conclave, or Celestine. In my experience Sisters work best behind their bolters and away from enemy blades.

[Dread]

I have found that a blunt object to the head of my opponent helps some, er um, but seriously, my best list so far was comprised with Furyou Miko's assistance. It has Celestine and a unit of seraphim with dual flamers, 3 units sisters in rhinos with melts guns,  unit of retribs with hvy bolters,  2 exorcists and dominions in immo with 2 melta guns. This was a few months back but it worked very well against CSM as well as Tau.

[*Furyou Miko]

If you're struggling to win with Sisters, either you need to practice with them more or you've got good opponents.

 

The only truly scary Grey Knight build is one that involves assaulting straight out of storm ravens, and that only because storm ravens are pretty much impossible to kill with our lack of anti-air weaponry.

 

Dreadknight: Repentia Squad.

Terminators: Exorcist pair.

Razorspam: Dominions.

 

Some things have specific counters. For everything else, there's a nun with a bolter.

[Aeropig]

Some things have specific counters. For everything else, there's a nun with a bolter.

Love that sentence right there.

[tvih]

Some things have specific counters. For everything else, there's a nun with a bolter.

Love that sentence right there.

It's just too bad that you really need that MasterCard to buy all those nuns I couldn't really justify buying more than slightly over the minimum amount of models to field them as allies reasonably. Meaning I have 9 bolter nuns, 2 flamers, 2 meltas, 4 heavy bolters, 2 superiors, Celestine, canoness. I was supposed to have an Immolator but alas the order was messed up by the store so I'm not sure when I'll make a new order to get it (as well as the two IG SL plasma gun guys that also ended up missing). There's certainly more models that I'd like - like some heavy flamers plus the other version of flamer (because of another mess-up I ended up with two identical ones), the seraphim (who seem to have lost a model or two in the past year unless I am mistaken?), the power sword superior... etc. Hesitant to buy any more bolter nuns since I hope at some point GW wakes the heck up and actually makes plastic ones so I can have more variety (and for cheaper).

[Warsmith Aznable]

I hope at some point GW wakes the heck up and actually makes plastic ones so I can have more variety (and for cheaper).

Welcome to His holy choir, I see you've already recieved your hymnal :p

[*Furyou Miko]

tvih - the key to a Sisters army is patience. You can't just buy an army. You have to build it over time. One of the reasons we Sisters players are so fanatical is that our armies have grown with us, learned with us, and stayed by our side... rather than just resulting from throwing a pile of cash at a wishlist and dumping the whole thing out on the table.

[tvih]

I could've just bought a full wishlist, but it would've been nuts to do that. I'd never buy enough at the current prices (well, actually I got 15% off rather than paying full GW price) to make a proper primary army. I already have 3 "primary" armies and IG+SoB as allied ones so I've certainly spent quite enough as is. I resisted buying Sisters for a full year (in other words pretty much ever since I got into tabletop 40k), and now I managed to resist buying in excess.

 

Still, like many folks I'm dubious as to GW ever getting around to doing plastics for SoB. But I must say I'm curious that with the lack of plastics they didn't even go the finecast route. As much as I hate the problems with finecast (luckily my most recent purchase, plague marines, seemed trouble-free) the canoness could've used the resin treatment in that it would've been far easier to make the arm options modular than it is with metal. And painting metal still seems a pain. Which is incidentally another reason why I may not buy all that much more of them on top of the price and monopose issues. The heft of metal is nice, but paint chipping really sucks.

[FashaTheDog]

There is always the chance that they've got so much stock that they've no need to switch to resin bolter nuns yet.  Either that or there is a Sister's player on staff who is fanatical about metal minis and has threatened, under penalty of righteous purging, that no one shall defile the range with air bubble filled resin.

[oreaper84]

there is ome reconstruction involved in making metal into finecast. All those lose bitz have to be reformulated into sprue form and i think GW may say screw the middle man ind associated costs, they'll be plastic in 14 anyway!!

 

@tvih: gratz on your start of a lifelong love/hate relationship in army form, i have rationed my purchases to once every few months for something small. A melta gun here, a particular superior there, maybe a vehicle or so. Sisters a truly a collectors army and one that causes a great deal of attachment. I've sold a few fully stocked 3k+ fully painted armies in my day but i will never....NEVER sell my gals

[Flake]

I wouldn't worry about it. When the new Marines came out just now, did you notice that literally nothing came out in Finecast? Not a single kit? I think GW has gotten their plastic molding technology where it needs to be to make the Sisters the army they should be. Though, to be honest, I think they were there when they released Dark Eldar back in 5E.

 

On topic: Did a Team Tournament with my Sisters this weekend. They have amazing synergy with 6E Tau. We took 3rd, missing contention for 1st by three VP total. St. Celestine was dubbed "Sister Troll Face" for her ability to confuse the heck out of opponents. On her own (no Seraphim), she murdered two Wolf Lords, killed a Necron skimmer (don't know the name), chased 300 points of Guard off the table, and shook off no less than 6 lascannon shots to the face. At the end, she was still standing. She is key to any Sisters victory.

 

I also have renewed love for the basic bolter Sister. Watching them go toe to toe with 6E Ultramarines and win really gave me some respect for what you get for 125 pts. 3+, a native 6++, and BS4 is not bad at all.